Hmmm... (rubbing chin)... Seven notes, you say!
Thanks. Getting interestinger and interestinger.
RBH
G GRIFFITHS wrote:
I heard an interview with Stephen Schwartz on Radio 3's 'Stage and Screen' a
few weeks ago, talking about Wicked.
If you take the first seven notes of 'Unlimited, my future is...' from 'The
Wizard and I', they are in fact the same notes as 'Somewhere Over The
Rainbow', but with a different rhythm.
Apparently, so he said, you are only allowed seven notes before copyright
kicks in.
No idea if he is correct.
Gary Griffiths
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of
dhbailey
Sent: 05 March 2007 20:17
To: finale@shsu.edu
Subject: Re: [Finale] How much can I quote?
Raymond Horton wrote:
Thanks, Christopher, for that link, and to everyone else for the
excellent and extremely helpful advice I received here on this subject.
For example, I wonder if the opening 7-note guitar riff from
Lennon-McCartney's "Yer' Birthday, " used in a serious, somewhat
quodlibet-type composition (not sampled), used out of the blue to give a
birthday reference (in other words - meant to be recognizable) would
constitute plagiarism (my guess is probably) or could it be protected
by any sort of artistic license or any other such thing. Not really a
musical parody, but possibly close to one.
[snip]
My guess would be that such a short quotation would be alright
[disclaimer: I'm not a lawyer and this is just a guess] since it in no
way would diminish the merchantability of the original, would in no way
be mistaken for the original.
I think the only way you could parody that song would be to change the
lyrics so it didn't refer to a birthday but to a deathday or a wedding
day or some other sort of special day (even something like "They say
it's a Tuesday, We're gonna have a dull time." would be a parody) but
simply throwing in a snippet of the song (unless it were possibly in the
midst of an arrangement of The Funeral March) wouldn't, in my decidedly
non-legally-trained mind, constitute any legal parody.
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